Gent. Alack, poor gentleman! Kent.Of Albany's and Cornwall's powers you heard not? Kent. Well, sir, I'й bring you to our master Lear, The same. SCENE IV. [Exeunt. A Tent. Enter CORDELIA, Physician, and Soldiers. In our sustaining corn.-A century send forth; In the restoring his bereaved sense? He, that helps him, take all my outward worth. Our foster-nurse of nature is repose, The which he lacks; that to provoke in him, Are many simples operative, whose power Cor. All bless'd secrets, All you unpublish'd virtues of the earth, Spring with my tears! be aidant, and remediate, That wants the means to lead it.6 Enter a Messenger. Mes. Madam, news; The British powers are marching hitherward. In expectation of them.-O dear father, [3] Fumitory. By the old herbalists, written fumittery. HARRIS. [4] Harlocks must be a typographical error for charlock, the common name of sinapis aroensis, wild mustard HARRIS. [5] Darnel, according to Gerard, is the most hurtful of weeds among corn. STEEVENS. [6] The reason which should guide it. JOHNSON. It is thy business that I go about ; My mourning, and important tears, hath pitied.? But love, dear love, and our ag'd father's right: SCENE V. [Exeunt. A Room in GLOSTER's Castle. Enter REGAN and Steward. Reg. But are my brother's powers set forth? Stew. Ay, madam. Reg. Himself In person there ? Stew. Madam, with much ado: Your sister is the better soldier. Reg. Lord Edmund spake not with your lord at home? Stew. No, madam. Reg. What might import my sister's letter to him? Reg. 'Faith, he is posted hence on serious matter. All hearts against us: Edmund, I think, is gone, His nighted life; moreover, to descry The strength o'the enemy. Stew. I must needs after him, madam, with my letter. Reg. Our troops set forth to-morrow; stay with us; The ways are dangerous. Stew. I may not, madam ; My lady charg'd my duty in this business. Reg.Why should she write to Edmund? Might not you Transport her purposes by word? Belike, Something-I know not what Let me unseal the letter. Stew. Madam, I had rather I'll love thee much, Reg. I know, your lady does not love her husband; I am sure of that: and, at her late being here, 1 She gave strange ciliads, and most speaking looks [7] Important, as in other places in this author, for importunate. JOHNS. [8] No inflated, no swelling pride. JOHNSON. [9] His life made dark as night by the extinction of his eyes. STEEVENS. [1] Oeillade, Fr. A cast, or significant glance of the eye.. STEEVENS. Stew. I, madam ? Reg. I speak in understanding; you are, I know it : Therefore, I do advise you, take this note :2 My lord is dead; Edmund and I have talk'd; Than for your lady's :-You may gather more. 3 If you do find him, pray you, give him this ; And when your mistress hears thus much from you, So, fare you well. If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor, Preferment falls on him that cuts him off. Stew. 'Would I could meet him, madam! I would show What party I do follow. Reg. Fare thee well. SCENE VI. [Exeunt. The Country near Dover. Enter GLOSTER, and EDGAR, dressed like a Peasant. Glo. When shall we come to the top of that same hill? Edg. You do climb up it now: look, how we labour. Glo. Methinks, the ground is even. Edg. Horrible steep : Hark, do you hear the sea? Glo. No, truly. Edg. Why, then your other senses grow imperfect By your eyes' anguish. Glo. So it may be, indeed : Methinks, thy voice is alter'd ;4 and thou speak'st Edg. You are much deceiv'd; in nothing am I chang'd, But in my garments. Glo. Methinks, you are better spoken. Edg. Come on, sir; here's the place :-stand still.How fearful And dizzy 'tis, to cast one's eyes so low! The crows, and choughs, that wing the midway air, JOHNSON. [2] Note means in this place not a letter, but a remark. [3] You may infer more than I have directly told you. JOHNSON. [4] Edgar alters his voice in order to pass afterwards for a malignant spirit. JOHNSON. Appear like mice; and yon' tall anchoring bark, Almost too small for sight: The murmuring surge, Glo. Set me where you stand. Edg. Give me your hand: You are now within a foot Of the extreme verge for all beneath the moon Would I not leap upright. Glo. Let go my hand. Here, friend, is another purse; in it, a jewel Well worth a poor man's taking: Fairies, and gods, Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going. [Seems to go. Edg. Why I do trifle thus with his despair, Is done to cure it. Glo. O, you mighty gods! This world do I renounce; and, in your sights, If I could bear it longer, and not fall To quarrel with your great opposeless wills, My snuff, and loathed part of nature, should Burn itself out. If Edgar live, O, bless him !— Now, fellow, fare thee well. [He leaps, and falls along. Edg. Gone, sir? farewell. And yet I know not how conceit may rob The treasury of life, when life itself Yields to the theft. Had he been where he thought, [5] Her cock-her cock-boat. JOHNSON. [6] This description has has been much admired since the time of Addison, who has remarked, with a poor attempt at pleasantry, that "he who can "read it without being giddy, has a very good head, or a very bad one." The description is certainly not mean, but I am far from thinking it wrought to the utmost excellence of poetry. He that looks from a precipice, finds himself assailed by one great and dreadful image of irresistible destruction. But this overwhelming idea is dissipated and enfeebled from the instant that the mind can restore itself to the observation of particulars, and diffuse its attention to distinct objects. The enumeration of the choughs and crows, the samphire man, and the fishers, counteracts the great effect of the pros. pect, as it peoples the desert of immediate vacuity, and stops the mind in the rapidity of its descent through emptiness and horror. JOHNSON. [7] When life is willing to be destroyed. JOHNSON. 8.. VOL. VIII. · Thus might he pass, indeed :-Yet he revives : Glo. Away, and let me die. Ed. Hadst thou been aught but gossomer, feathers, air, So many fathom down precipitating, Thou hadst shiver'd like an egg: but thou dost breathe; Edg. From the dread summit of this chalky bourn:" Look up a-height;-the shrill-gorg'd lark so far Cannot be seen or heard: do but look up. Glo. Alack, I have no eyes. Is wretchedness depriv'd that benefit, To end itself by death? 'Twas yet some comfort, Edg. Give me your arm: Up-So;-How is't? Feel you your legs? You stand. Glo. Too well, too well. Edg. This is above all strangeness. Upon the crown o'the cliff, what thing was that Glo. A poor unfortunate beggar. Edg. As I stood here below, methought, his eyes Were two full moons; he had a thousand noses, Horns whelk'd, and wav'd like the enridged sea; It was some fiend: Therefore, thou happy father, Think that the clearest gods, 3 who make them honours Of men's impossibilities, have preserv'd thee. Glo. I do remember now: henceforth I'll bear Affliction, till it do cry out itself, Enough, enough, and, die. That thing you speak of, I took it for a man ; often 'twould say, The fiend, the fiend: he led me to that place. Edg. Bear free and patient thoughts.4-But who comes here? [8]. Thus he might die in reality. We still use the word passing bell. JOH. 191 The substance called gossamer is formed of the collected webs of dying spiders, and during calm weather in autumn sometimes falls in amazing quantities. See Romeo and Juliet, p. 40. HOLT WHITE. [1] This chalky boundary. STEEVENS. [2] Varied with protuberances. STEEVENS. [3] The purest; the most free from evil. JOHNSON. So in Timon of Athens: "Roots, you clear gods." MALONE. [4] To be melancholy is to have the mind chained down to one painful |